All of the changes in The War Within pre-patch, now live

The War Within is coming to World of Warcraft very soon, and patch 11.0.1, the pre-patch is now live, bringing a lot of new game features. As always, besides introducing a fun and limited time pre-patch event (in this case, fighting off Azeroth’s bad memories in the form of Radiant Echoes, starting on July 30), there will also be a slew of big and small mechanical changes that have been brewing on the beta and public test realms coming to WoW. There are changes to everything from flying and talents to brand new systems like Warbands.

What won’t be in the 11.0.1 pre-patch

It’s important to keep in mind that pre-patch is not the expansion, so a lot of things will still be held back until the launch of the expansion. These things that will not be in the pre-patch include:

• The brand new continent of Khaz Algar, as well as the quest chain that leads us there.
• The Earthen Allied Race — makes sense, since we’re not on Khaz Algar yet to have even met them!
• Delves, the exciting new solo content where you get to earn raid-level rewards while hanging out with your pal Brann Bronzebeard!
• Hero Talents, because you get your first of those at level 71, and the pre-patch isn’t raising the level cap — that will come with the expansion launch.
• The end of Mists of Pandaria Remix: at least, not right away — strangely, despite the patch being on July 23, Remix doesn’t end until August 19, a week before the launch of The War Within. Don’t worry, though — you’ll still be able to stockpile catchup gear for those characters before they are freed into the main timeline.

Now that we know what not to expect, what will be in patch 11.0.1?

How Warbands is consolidating your character and account progression

Warbands represent a tectonic shift in the way Blizzard approaches character and account progression (although really it’s more like coming to terms with how players actually play the game these days). Earning the same reputation multiple times? Mostly over with, barring specific examples that are per-character choices like Aldor vs. Scryer, or the Winterpelt Furbolg “reputation” really being how well you can speak their language. Picking up the same flight points over and over on each character? A thing of the past. Mailing things to your alts? Done and dusted with the Warband Bank and currency transfers. (Somewhere, Katy Stampwhistle breathes a sigh of relief.) There’s many nuances to Warbands, but the upshot is that almost everything you do in The War Within related to reputation, exploration, and so on will be something you won’t have to repeat on future alts.

There’s also a lot of incentive to level alternate characters — getting two to max level will net you a map toy that will explore the map for anywhere your Warband members have been, and there’s even more stuff coming once the expansion launches.

One important caveat about Warbands, though: they may cause a login queue when the pre-patch drops. While you won’t have to log into every character (like you did when achievements went account-wide — who else remembers that?), logging into the game for the first time after pre-patch will trigger the Warband setup process to run on your account, which can take up to 20 minutes. Get a drink, get comfy, and then get ready to reap the benefits.

What’s new with transmog?

An additional side effect of Blizzard’s philosophy of only doing things once comes in the form of some huge benefits to transmog collectors. Once the pre-patch drops, you’ll be able to look at your transmog collection and filter it by any class, not just the character you’re currently playing on. Perhaps just as important, you’ll be able to learn appearances for any armor or weapon type, not just the ones you can equip. Could be a good time to go visit an old raid and farm up some new hot looks for that new army of alts you’re planning to play in The War Within!

Many class changes coming and one major racial change

While Hero Talents are not coming in the pre-patch, you will likely find plenty of ability and talent changes to go around. Every class and spec has received some attention, and some of them got a lot of it. You can always try and follow the PTR development notes, but you can check the patch notes for a more concise rundown of changes. Because these changes always arrive early, pre-patch is always a good time to feel out how your class and spec of choice will play in the next expansion. You’ll also be able to create a combined 40 talent loadouts — rather than 10 — for a single character.

There’s also one major racial ability change coming in the pre-patch — the old Human racial ability Diplomacy is going away, replaced with No Place Like Home. If you have any reputations that you’ve been putting off where you really value that 10% bonus, you might want to step up the rep grinding.

Dragonriding gets a new name — Skyriding

We’ve covered this one before, but it’s worth noting so that it doesn’t catch anyone off guard — Dragonriding is now Skyriding, and a number of changes come along with that.

• There’s no longer a real distinction between Skyriding mounts and non-Skyriding mounts, for the most part. (The ones Blizzard specifically notes will not swap to Skyriding are the Otherworldly Ottuk Carrier, some fish mounts, and brooms.) Instead, you will have a new option in the mount collection window to change your flight style between Skyriding and Steady Flying (the old flying style). You can also put these on your bars for easy access.
• Steady Flying is also finally getting a speed boost from the old maximum that it first got back when the Violet Proto-Drake came out. It will still feel slower than regular flying, but hopefully not by nearly as much anymore.
• Dracthyr will be able to Steady Fly using Soar, as well.

Radiant Echoes is the new pre-patch event

On July 30, the pre-patch event will begin and players will be directed to Dalaran to take part (it’s available from level 10 onward). You’ll want to make Dalaran your home base for a while if you’re intending to take part in this event to take advanatge of the convenient portals there that will help you get to and from the three zones where this event will be happening. In the event zones, Azeroth spawns copies of her memories that will reward Residual Echoes, a new currency used to purchase item level 480 Warband-bound gear, Azerite-colored faction mounts, pets, and even — with some additional collection — a new heirloom ring, the Band of Radiant Echoes.

Since the gear you purchase from this event is bound to your Warband until equipped (or as Blizzard has nicknamed it, “WuE”), you can take part in the event on any character and store the gear for any other character in the Warband Bank. If you are thinking of taking a character from WoW Remix into The War Within, or any other alt for that matter, this is the perfect way to get them some gear using your retail character.

Originally published July 15, 2024; updated July 24, 2024.